Chapter 15 — Your Next 90 Days

Ben

You have read a guide. That is the easy part.

Reading a guide does not make you safer. It does not make your household safer. It does not improve a single fundamental skill. The only thing that does any of that — every time, without exception — is what you do next.

This chapter is the shortest one in the book, on purpose. It is a plan for your next ninety days. If you do nothing else with this guide, do this.

— Ben

Week 1 — One action

Book the session.

That is the action. If you are in the Treasure Valley, book a 2 Hour Private Lesson with me at Integrated Defensive Solutions. If you are outside the area, use the framework in Chapter 6 to identify the right instructor in your region, and book the first session with them — whatever that first session looks like in their practice.

Do not research more. Do not buy gear first. Do not wait for the right moment.

The right moment is the moment you book.

Month 1 — A reading list and a rhythm

In the four weeks after you book your first session:

Read two things. - The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker — for the threat-awareness side of mindset. - In the Gravest Extreme by Massad Ayoob — for the legal-frame side.

Both are short. Both are foundational. Both are cited in the back of this guide.

Start a rhythm. Three short dry-practice sessions a week. Ten to fifteen minutes each. The starter routine from Chapter 4 is enough to begin with. Get the safety routine ingrained before your first formal session. Your instructor will appreciate it. Your infinite system will appreciate it more.

Track what you do. Notebook, spreadsheet, ShootTrackPro — pick a tool. The students who track are the students who progress.

Months 2 and 3 — Building a real practice

After your first session, you will have a plan from your instructor. The plan will be specific to you. Follow it.

In the second and third months, build:

• One live-fire session per month, run as a real session — with structure, drills, and recorded results.

• Continued dry practice — three to four times a week, ten to fifteen minutes each.

• A second formal class booked, somewhere in the second half of the year.

• One household conversation, if you have not yet had it.

• One hour with a qualified attorney in your jurisdiction, on the legal framework. Not optional.

Ninety days from now, if you have done this, you will be a different student than you are today. You will know what your gaps are. You will know what your priorities are. You will have a relationship with an instructor who has assessed you honestly and given you a real plan.

That is the foundation. Everything that follows in this discipline gets built on it.

A closing word, from each of them

The five people whose stories ran through this guide all started where you are. None of them are real. All of them are composites of students Ben has actually trained.

Sarah is six months into her training now. She has had her first foundational class. She has a holster, a firearm she chose herself, and a regular dry-practice routine. She has not had to draw the weapon she now carries. She does not lie awake at night thinking about the parking-lot night anymore.

Marcus is a year and a half in. He measures his practice. He tracks his progress. He trains with his daughter now — not as her teacher, but as her peer. He is, by his own account, a better shooter than he was a year ago, and a much better student.

David has built a sustainable rhythm into his calendar. His wife trains alongside him, on her own schedule. Their household has a plan. He has had the conversation with his kids. He carries some of the time. He does not feel the way he felt the morning after he heard about his colleague.

Diane trains weekly with reduced round counts and short sessions. She knows the legal frame in Idaho. She is, by her own account, sleeping better than she has in eight months. She has not yet had to decide whether she could pull the trigger. She has decided, quietly, that she would.

Ryan has unlearned what didn’t transfer and kept what did. He trains with civilian instructors who are unimpressed by his service. His wife and his kids are safer than they were two years ago, in a state that did not allow him to take responsibility for that safety. He is finally honest about what he doesn’t know.

Each of them is somewhere on a long road. None of them is finished. Neither will you be — ninety days from now, or three years from now, or ten.

The point is not to finish. The point is to be on the road.

Book the session

If you are in the Treasure Valley:

If you are outside the area: use the framework in Chapter 6. Find your instructor. Book your first session this week.

You have read the guide.

Now go.

— Ben